Keys
by EndlessHetalia
Summary: Feliciano was always the one rescued by Ludwig. But now the tables have turned and Feliciano must compete in a game that could mean death for them both if he fails, and death for others he cares about if he succeeds.
1. Let's play a game

A/N: I am still continuing 'Get Well soon' but since thats almost finished I've decided to jump right it with a new one.

* * *

"Wake up." A soft female voice cooed in the Italians ear. "Wake up~!" Feliciano slowly opened his eyes, his body felt stiff and weighed down as if he'd been drugged. Though that seemed a little far fetched to him, since the last thing he remembered was laying down for his three o'clock siesta.

However he wasn't frightened at all by the sight which greeted him as he woke. A dozen or so pretty ladies and a table filled with all his favourite food. "Ciao pretty ladies, is this all for me?" His face was already lit up with glee, saliva pooling in to his mouth with the anticipation of eating.

"Yes Feliciano, all for you." The same female voice said. She was a dark skinned slither of a being, with soft caring eyes and a gentle smile. Feliciano wanted to reach out and stroke her braided hair but instead turned his attention to the table. He took a seat, though the seats seemed a little too tall for the table and elevated him slightly above it.

The girls around him paid no attention, they talked to themselves and seemed occupied with sheets of paper and equipment. "Pretty lady, what is all this stuff for?" Feliciano asks after swallowing a mouthful of food.

The woman who had spoken to him smiles wide, showing off sparkling white teeth. "It's to get you ready, give you energy and finalize preparations."

"Preparations for what?" Feliciano asks curiously, a forkful of spaghetti half way to his mouth.

"You'll see." She giggles mysteriously.

The women start to move out of the room through a pink painted door and the Italian starts to shovel down food, in case he's about to be asked to move on and leave his banquet behind.

"It's fine Feliciano, you stay here, our boss wants to talk with you." His companion says and then she too leaves.

Feliciano looks down at his food and suddenly starts to feel lonely, even with pasta for comfort.

"Are you enjoying your meal?"

Feliciano jumps half a mile in the air and looks around wildly, his appetite leaving as fear creeps down his spine and through his veins. Though a strong male voice had spoken, there was no one in the room.

"Uh…s-si Mister Voice." The Italian shivered, hands clinging to the side of the table.

"Good. Now, why don't we play a little game?" The voice asks. Immediately Feliciano starts to scream, working himself up in to tears as he so often did.

"Oh God I'm in one of those Saw movie things aren't I and now you're going to tell me that the food was poisoned and I'll have to do something really horrible and painful in order to get the antidote even though I'll probably die of blood loss anyway!" He screams out without so much as taking a breathe.

"What? No, not at all."

"Really?" Feliciano stops screaming and smiles brightly again. "Oh I'm so happy! So what kind of game do you want to play Mister Voice?"

"Call me The Game master."

Feliciano gasped. "Are you Captain N?"

"What- what's wrong with you? Just call me The Game Master and listen up." The voice sounded irritated and whoever it belonged to was no doubt frowning at this moment.

Feliciano giggled a little through his nerves and went back to eating. Now he felt he had nothing to fear, his appetite had returned.

"I've captured Ludwig." The Game Master proudly declares.

Feliciano drops his fork. Ludwig? Captured? A sick feeling enters his stomach and his appetite vanished for good (for now at least). "You're lying, Ludwig wouldn't let himself get captured…"

"Lying am I?"

One of the panels in the wall of glass turns out to be a television screen but the image it shows Feliciano is so horrific that he once more bursts in to tears. It was Ludwig allright, the German's arms were tied via thick chains to the walls behind him, forcefully raising them up above his beat up face.

He was wearing no shirt, which gave Feliciano a perfect view of the mess that used to be the Germans chest and now was nothing more than a bloody mess of flesh that had been whipped almost clean away from the bones.

"Give him back!" Feliciano stood up, knocking the table over accidentally with his knees, though it may have looked like an act of anger and defiance. "Give Ludwig back!"

"It's up to you to get him back this time Feliciano. And that's where the game comes in." The Game Master says, his voice now cool and placid. "Sit and I'll explain."

With a disgruntled wail Feliciano sits down and looks away from the screen. The Game Masters voice pulses in to his head. "I will show you to Ludwig. But first you have to get three keys. One to unlock the prison he is held in, one to unlock the right manacle and one to unlock the left. Does that sound fair to you?" Feliciano nods sadly.

"What do I have to do, to get these keys?" The Italian asks slowly.

"Ah!" The Game Master sighs. "You're getting it already, very good. In order to get these keys you are simple to complete a set of challenges without dying."

Feliciano swallowed with difficulty and tried to moisten his lips, but his whole mouth seems to have been evacuated of moisture. "I will show you where the first key is, and that is it. You must work out what the challenge is, how to use it to get the key and where the other two are."

"That doesn't seem fair!" Feliciano wails, throwing his hands up over his face. "They could be anywhere in the whole wide world and Ludwig could be dead at any moment!"

"If you don't compete, Ludwig will most certainly die. You aren't the only one trying to rescue a loved one or dear friend."

More screens flashed on. Vasch trying to rescue his sister. Kiku trying to rescue Heracles and most surprisingly of all Arthur trying to rescue Francis. Or all of them, Feliciano had no idea who he was most afraid of. He was glad however, that he would not be competing with his brother.

"Each of you will have unique First Keys. But the second and third…there are only one each of those, so if you don't get both before they do. Ludwig will die." The Game Maker states almost proudly. "And so will you. The others know this too and will probably try to kill you on sight, just to increase their chances."

What was he supposed to do? Feliciano felt so torn. He didn't want sweet little Lilli, Heracles with his cats that Feliciano adored, Francis who had always been like a big brother to him, his friend Kiku, or even scary Vasch and Arthur to die because he won this game and yet…

Feliciano didn't feel like he could win. Vasch, Kiku, Arthur…they were all so much better skilled and able to face any challenge that came their way. Reluctantly Feliciano's eyes return to the image of Ludwig. Ludwig…he had to try save him. If only to get that moment to tell the German just how much Feliciano loved him.

"Okay. I'm do it. I'll play your game."


	2. This part should be easy!

After Feliciano sealed his and the German's fate by agreeing to the game, the women from before came back into the room. The head of this group was a young brunette whose hair was cut so short Feliciano had at first not been able to tell what colour her hair was at all. He wondered if she had chosen to do that herself or if it had been some kind of punishment. He shuddered at the thought of his precious curl being snipped off. She held out her hand without a word and the Italian took it.

Feliciano felt a pinprick of pain in his palm and as the woman withdraw her hand he saw she had been holding a small pin the whole time. A pin tipped with something sticky that now seeped in to his body through the tiny hole the metal had made in his skin. The Italian stared at this hole for a moment before he began to feel dizzy. He opened his mouth and spoke, but the words came out jumbled like he had had too much wine. He slumped in the chair, unconscious.

* * *

Upon awakening, the world was still fuzzy. Feliciano blinked and a mass of dark grey came to view in front of his face. It took another moment for him to realize that he was staring at a grey concrete floor and a dirty grey wall that may have once been a wonderful shade of white. Sitting up slowly he took a look around at his new settings. To his right was a tall wooden gate whose hinges had long since rusted. To the left a long passageway with semi-darkness at the end. Feliciano squinted but he couldn't make out anything else at that end except the vague shape of a ladder.

Directly in front of him was the side of a building the Italian assumed was some sort of garage or barn. Perhaps something in between with its shingled roof and smooth wooden walls. It was the wall that captured his attention because someone had spray painted a key onto it. The Italian beamed in delight and clasped his hands together in front of him. The first key must have been inside, though it seemed too easy he supposed that the first one was meant to be easy anyway.

Feliciano trotted towards the gate, confident that he could simply ask the owner of the building to let him in and then he'd retrieve the key and be one step closer to rescuing Ludwig. The image of Ludwig so beaten up almost stopped Feliciano in his tracks but he shook it off. He grabbed the handle of the gate and pushed. The gate did not budge even an inch, so he pulled instead but only met with the same problem. Taking a few steps back Feliciano ran at the gate and smashed his shoulder into it. A jarring pain shot through the muscle and he gave a howl of pain that cut off into sob. Dabbing at the tears of pain that had sprouted he rubbed his shoulder until it felt a little better. Looking up Feliciano judged the height of the gate and took ten paces back before running at it again. He sprang at the last second and caught hold of the top. A hiss of pain rose from him from the connection, the top of the gate was surprisingly sharp. Here Feliciano found himself stuck. He wiggled his legs a little, trying to find a grip against the wood but to no effect as it proved to be well varnished wood despite the condition of its hinges. He let out a defeated sigh and dropped back to the ground.

"Ludwig's doomed and it's all my fault. I can't even get the first key and this is the easy part!" He wailed to himself, the sound of his own voice a comfort in the silent alley. Getting over both the fence and the wall he had been looking at when he'd first awoken would be a definite no-no.

Then it struck him. This was a game wasn't it? And sometimes in a game you failed because you were doing the wrong thing, especially in a strategy game such as this one. So maybe he wasn't supposed to climb out, maybe the answer to getting inside the storage building to retrieve the key was in a different tactic. A flash in the corner of his eye caught Feliciano's attention. Turning the Italian's eyes widened at the sight of a small camera suspending in the air by rapidly beating wings. The lens moved, zooming in and then shot off into the sky. Feliciano followed it as long as he could and then brought his eyes back down. A glimmer of hope shone in his eyes. There was a sky light in the roof of the storage building. It was on a slant, so nearest to the wall than the middle of the building. Remembering the ladder Feliciano hatched an idea.

He could retrieve the ladder, climb up to the roof, open the sky light, use the ladder to get inside, retrieve the key and climb back out and down again. What then? Would he be taken away to a different place to get his next key? The Game master hadn't really specified that. Perhaps it was another part of the game. Perhaps what ever was on the other side held a clue. The Italian shrugged to himself and turned towards the darkened tunnel.

"It's scary...I don't want to go down there."

The image of Ludwig reappeared to give him encouragement and he set off slowly. His footsteps made loud echoing sounds against the red brick walls. Feliciano kept his eyes of the shape of the ladder which was becoming more and more clear the farther he went. However he did not fail to notice a sudden low growling. Feliciano stepped back as a large dog lumbered into view. "Aster?" he said, recognising the dog from Ludwig's home.

Whether it was the same dog or not, the canine was after blood as it ran at the Italian barking and snapping its drooling jaws. Feliciano turned tail and ran, sure that at any moment the dog would knock him down and eat him alive or perhaps just chew him up very badly and leave him to bleed to death. He made it to the gate and started to panic before he realized that the sound of padding paws had ceased behind him. Looking back he saw the canine was chained to somewhere at the back of the passageway. Its chain allowed it only to the end of the passageway and no further. Giving a grunt of disappointment the dog trotted back down the passageway and somewhere just out of sight.

Feliciano's heart was thumping hard in his chest, he licked his lips and met the metallic taste of sweat. But he had to get the ladder somehow, dog or no dog. If he was stuck here the whole time then someone else would get their keys for sure and rescue their friend, leaving Ludwig to be killed. A soft moan trickled out of the Italians mouth. He walked carefully to the start of the passageway and set his eyes on the shape of the ladder. He was a fast runner, maybe faster than the dog. He could run down and fetch the ladder back surely, depending on what the ladder weighed. At least if it was heavy he could perhaps hit the dog in the face with it though that thought already made him feel guilt for he would rather not hurt the animal even if the dog would happily chew him to bits. Taking a deep breath he retreated to the gate. Feliciano braced himself against it like an Olympic runner about to make the dash of his life. Setting his eyes once more on the ladder he pushed off the unyielding wood and pelted down the passageway as fast as his legs would carry him (and that was pretty fast).


End file.
